Best 111 quotes of Lauren Bacall on MyQuotes

About working with Marilyn Monroe.We got along very well. My only complaint about her was that she was late all the time, but she was late out of fear as much as anything else, but it was hard to sit around and wait. She was usually an hour or two late every morning.

Acting is a life of rejection.

Actors today go into TV, which I don't consider has a lot to do with acting. They only think of stardom. If you photograph well, that's enough. I have a terrible time distinguishing one from another. Girls wear their hair the same, and are much too anorexic-looking.

Actors today go into TV, which I don't consider has a lot to do with acting. They only think of stardom

After the age of 30 in the movie profession, you're pretty well over as far as the casting people are concerned.

Always I'm feeling, 'You're never going to work again.' That's going to happen one day, but I hope I'm not alive.

A man's illness is his private territory and, no matter how much he loves you and how close you are, you stay an outsider. You are healthy.

As long as I can walk and talk, I'll try almost anything. I say "almost" because the high wire is definitely out.

A woman isn't complete without a man. But where do you find a man - a real man - these days?

Being a liberal is the best thing on earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind... I'm total, total, total liberal and proud of it. And I think it's outrageous to say "The L word". I mean, excuse me. They should be damn lucky that they were liberals here. Liberals gave more to the population of the United States than any other group.

Being a liberal is the best thing on earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind.

Each time a friend dies, the present becomes the past, in an instant.

Everything in this country [the US] has got to be good looks and unlined faces and thin bodies and people running around in skirts slit up to their ass. It has nothing to do with thinking or with being a human being. There is life in mature people; it's not all over at 24½.

Find me a man who's interesting enough to have dinner with and I'll be happy.

Generally women are better than men -- they have more character. I prefer men for some things, obviously, but women have a greater sense of honor and are more willing to take a chance with their lives.

God if the press ever quoted anyone correctly it would be brilliant.

Growing up takes longer than you think.

He [Bogie] had tremendous character and a great sense of honor and would not tolerate lies, even if they asked him what he thought of a movie. We were once at a screening at somebody's house, I forget whose, and they ran a movie that he was in, that he never thought much of. Afterward, the producer asked what he thought of it, and Bogie said "I think it's a crock." And this producer was horrified! He was about to release the movie, and he said to Bogie "Why would you say that?!" Bogie shrugged and said "Then don't ask me." He never played the schmoozing game. He was not into that at all.

He named me. He liked the sound of it. And I said, well, all right. I felt a little odd about it. I don't understand all that name changing business anyway... No, he felt that Lauren Bacall was better sounding than Betty Bacall. He had a vision of his own. He was a svengali. He wanted to mold me. He wanted to control me. And he did until Mr. Bogart got involved.

His (Frank Sinatra) attention span was not long, shall we say.

Hollywood is the only place in the world where an amicable divorce means each one gets fifty percent of the publicity.

Howard Hawks said he'd like to put me in a film with Cary Grant or Humphrey Bogart. I thought, "Cary Grant-terrific! Humphrey Bogart-yucch.

How in hell can you handle love without turning your life upside down? That's what love does, it changes everything.

How long an actress lives professionally depends on her stamina, the extent of her masochism, her imagination, and her yearning for recognition or approval.

How many women do we know who were continually kissed by Clark Gable, William Powell, Cary Grant, Spencer Tracy and Fredric March? Only one: Myrna Loy...

I always brought up my children not to believe in Mothers Day gifts, and now I regret it.

I always thought I had crooked eyebrows and crooked teeth. That's why I never understood why people called me a beauty.

I am not a has-been. I am a will-be.

I am not a wealthy woman. I wish to hell I was, but I never had a wealthy man.

I called my business manager in California and said, 'Sell all of my stock' - what little of it I had - and it's the only smart financial move I ever made.

I don't consider myself a great actress. I'm just trying to stay alive, actually. I think I'm good, and I've learned a lot, certainly, mostly in the theater. I've been sloughed off movies for years. But what can you do? That's life.

I figure if I have my health, can pay the rent and I have my friends, I call it 'content.'

I don't sit around thinking that I'd like to have another husband; only another man would make me think that way.

I don't think being the only child of a single parent helped. I was always a little unsteady in my self-belief. Then there was the Jewish thing. I love being Jewish, I have no problem with it at all. But it did become like a scar, with all these people saying you don't look it.

I fairly often have thought how lucky I was. I knew everybody because I was married to Bogie, and that 25-year difference was the most fantastic thing for me to have in my life.

If goodness is its own reward, shouldn't we get a little something for being naughty?

If there was a pause in a conversation with anyone, you could always light a cigarette, or if a man lit a cigarette for you, you could look up. It's the most dramatic thing in the world because it's intimate, it's suggestive, and that's one of the problems with giving it up, is that it's a very useful tool.

If there was one thing I had never been, it was mysterious, and if there was one thing I had never done, it was not talk.

If you want me just whistle. You know how to whistle don't you? Just put your lips together and blow.

I have made mistakes in the past and been in movies that really weren't good, and that I needed the money at the time, or something -- and the money wasn't even that great. But I needed it, and... they come back on television, those movies... to haunt you. And it's a nightmare!

I hope I'm thought of as not just a showbiz personality, but as someone who has lived a life and who has hopefully made a contribution to something along the way - someone who is a human being as well as an actress.

I like to work with really good professional people - anyone with real talent.

I'll miss Hollywood. Of the twenty friends I thought I had, I'll miss the six I really had.

Imagination is the highest kite one can fly.

I'm a total Democrat. I'm anti-Republican. And it's only fair that you know it... I'm liberal. The L word!

I'm crazy enough to believe in taking chances in every way, in making choices and gambling with your life. That's the kind of gambling I believe in.

I'm not a sedentary person. I've always been active.

I’m not ashamed of what I am - of how I pass through this life. What I am has given me the strength to do it. At my lowest ebb I have never contemplated suicide. I value what is here too much. I have a contribution to make. I am not just take up space in this life. I can add something to the lives I touch. I don’t like everything I know about myself, and I’ll never be satisfied, but nobody’s perfect. I’m not sure where the next years will take me - what they will hold - but I’m open to suggestions.

I never believed marriage was a lasting institution . . . I thought that to be married for five years was to be married forever.

In Hollywood, an equitable divorce settlement means each party getting fifty percent of publicity.